“Go to it. I’m getting an orange juice. You too? Or something stronger.”

“Not on duty. Juice will do fine.”

The Major read slowly and carefully. Brian read as well, a copy he had printed out of a tutorial article by Carbonell about the new mathematical field of excluor geometry. It was a subject of psychology, concerned basically with the question of why people begin to use diagrams whenever verbal explanations get too complicated. This was because language is still fundamentally serial and one-dimensional. We can say former or latter — but there is no easy way to refer to four or five things at the same time. With AI always in the front of his mind he realized that just because human intelligence worked this way did not put any limitations on artificial intelligence. Instead of three or four pronoun-like ideas, an AI could handle dozens of “pronomes” at the same time. He blinked and looked up when he heard the lawyer laugh as he put the contract down. He shook his head and drained the glass of juice before he spoke.

“As we used to say back in law school — you been screwed without the benefit of being laid. This contract is worse than you said. I really think you wouldn’t profit at all from your work if you left their employment. And as long as you worked for them the profit would be all theirs.”

“Can you write me a better contract?”

“With pleasure. Since the Army wants to see AI developed as much as anyone does, it would be very much in our favor to sort this matter out at once. But there are some strange precedents here. The contract is legal and binding — but you didn’t sign it?”

“No, the older me did. The me sitting here never saw it until yesterday.”

Mike rubbed his hands together happily as he walked back and forth the length of the room. “Oh, would I love the fees for arguing this one in court! You have them by the short and curlies because, stop me if I’m wrong, you are still far ahead of everyone else in developing a really smart AI.”

“I hope I am. Apparently I was on the right track before my… accident, and Dr. Snaresbrook thinks there is a good chance I can get back to where I was. But right now, I’m still studying the basics and there’s no guarantee that I can get back in front. But I have all the notes, and I’ll do my best.”

“Of course you will — and you are Megalobe’s only hope. Nothing wins in this world like having a monopoly. I am going to suggest to my superiors that they suggest to Megalobe that this contract be tossed out and a new one written. Does that satisfy you? Would you still sue?”

“A new contract and no lawsuit. What should I ask for?”

“Something simple and sweet. They put up the readies to develop AI. You put up the AI. Any net profit from future development of AI will be split fifty-fifty between the parties concerned.”

Brian was shocked. “You mean I should ask for half of all profit from AI? That could be millions, maybe billions of dollars!”

“Yup. Nothing wrong with being a billionaire, is there?”

“No — but it is kind of a new idea.”

“Want me to start on this?”

“Yes, please.”

Mike stood and looked at the contract and sighed dramatically. “This is the first time since I enlisted that I have had the slightest desire to be back in private practice. If I was the shyster handling this new contract would I really make a bundle!”

“Someone once told me that lawyers eat their young.”

“Brian my boy — it’s true! I’ll get back to you as soon as I have any news.”

Brian napped after lunch and was feeling much better when the nurse opened the door and the hospital orderly pushed in the wheelchair at four in the afternoon.

“Ready for your session with the doctor?” the nurse asked.

“I sure am. Can’t I walk down there?”

“Sit. Doctor’s orders.”

Brian grabbed the bound sheaf of papers he had been reading and took it with him. He remained sitting in the wheelchair as the tendrils brushed his neck and slid the thin fiber-optic link into place.

“Doc, can I ask a favor for this session?”

“Of course, Brian. What is it?”

“This.” He held up the papers. “I did a graduate course in topology and this is an article about it that I just printed out. I started to read it and found that I am really out of my depth. If I read it now is there any chance you can access my earlier memories of the field? Will anything show up on your dials to show you’ve hit the right spot? Then you can press the button and give me my memories back.”

“I wish it were that easy — but we can certainly try. I was going to suggest input like this in any case — so am more than willing to have a go at it now.”

The material was pretty intractable and Brian had to reread a lot for it to make any sense. He worked his way almost halfway through the article before he put it down.

“Any contacts, Doc?”

“Lots of activity, though it is so widespread that it is obvious that a very large number of K-lines are involved. My machine is not set up to handle networking like this. This is the kind of cross-connecting that only the human brain is so good at.”

Brian pinched the bridge of his nose. “Bit tired. Can we call it a day?”

“Of course. We agreed to always pull the plug at the first hint of fatigue.”

“Thanks. I wish I could access the inbuilt CPU with commands more complex than ‘Turn Off.’ ”

“Well, you can always try.”

“Wouldn’t it be great if I could? Just issue the order to the CPU. You there, CPU, open the file on topology.”

Brian’s smile turned suddenly to one of surprise. He stared into space, then focused his eyes on Dr. Snaresbrook.

“Now that is what I call very interesting. Didn’t I say when I came in that I knew little or nothing about the mathematical field of topology? Well I must have been very tired or something, just not concentrating. But now I remember my thesis very well. It had a lot of what was new stuff at the time. It started simply by using an algebraic theory of knots based on the old Vaughn Jones polynomial to classify chaotically invariant trajectories, then applied this to various physics problems. Nothing very inspired and I’m sure that it must be pretty old hat now. I’m beginning to understand why I quit pure math and went into AI.”

Brian seemed to take his uploaded, transplanted memories for granted — but not Snaresbrook. Her hands were shaking so hard that she had to bring them together. Brian had used the CPU implant to interface with his own memories. There really was an internal man-machine interface in operation.

The rest area of the tenth floor of the hospital was more like a roof garden than a balcony. A marine guard at the door checked Benicoff’s ID before he let him proceed between the potted palms. Brian was sitting with his head in the shade of the beach umbrella; he had managed to sunburn his face by falling asleep in the sun the previous day and didn’t want a rerun. He looked up from his book and waved.

“Good to see you, Ben.”

“Likewise — though you are not going to like the news. There won’t be any court order for those data bases of yours. In recent years the tightening up of the secrecy laws has ruled out access of this kind. If you were dead it would be different.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Every once in a while someone gets killed in a car accident and leaves no record of his access codes. There has to be hearings, proof of relationship, a lot of work is needed to get a court order, let me tell you. And there are no exceptions to this.”

“Then what can I do?”

“Go physically to the data base. Prove that you are you and then it is up to the company to decide if they will release the material or not. And that is going to be tricky.”

“Why?”

“Because — and I am deadly serious — the company with your files is not in the country. It’s in Mexico.”